Bernal Adobe
Site

Walking Tour of Site

by Mike
Boulland

Baldwin Elementary
School

When the Bernal family live at Rancho Santa Teresa, the Bernal men were reputed grizzly bear hunters. Imagine, once grizzlies roamed the Santa Clara Valley. It is said that the Bernal men hunted the grizzlies with lassos on horseback, and brought the bears back to the rancho alive. They tied these bears to an oak tree that still stands in Santa Teresa Park near where the Bernal Adobe stood. At roundup time the Bernals would attrack prospective cattle buyers to Rancho Santa Teresa by holding bear and bull fights.

Santa
Teresa Spring:According to
legend,
a black robed woman led Ohlone tribal leaders to this spring
to cure the tribe of a mysterious illness. During the winter
storms of 1997 the spring was covered over by fallen debris.

Dottie's
Pond:According to local
legend, one day a member of the Bernal family named Dottie
was floating on an inner tube in the pond just below Santa
Teresa Spring when out of the depths of the pond came a hand
which grabbed her causing her to drown.